By Sarah Tan
DNAinfo Reporter
HARLEM — One year ago, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head during a massacre in her home state of Arizona that shook the nation.
On Sunday, as the country marked the anniversary of the shooting that left six dead and 13 wounded, advocates gathered in Harlem to protest against the scourge of gun violence that has affected the city.
In September, Harlem basketball star Tayshana Murphy was murdered in her building at the Grant Houses.
And just before the New Year, 18-year-old Harlem resident Walter Sumter was gunned down outside of a party on West 154th Street.
The victims are among the 5,000 people who were shot in New York over the past two years, advocates said.
New Yorkers Against Gun Violence rallied in front of the State Office Building on 125th Street to raise awareness of gun control laws and and put the focus on the families left behind after gun violence.
"This event is to raise awareness and to take a moment to think about the victims' families," the group's director, Jackie Hilly, said. "After all the news reports, it's the families that are left behind and they have lost something they can never replace, so we want to also remember them."
JoAnn Soto, 38, of the South Bronx lost her 17-year-old son to gun violence in December of 2010 and came to the rally because she felt that awareness about this issue needed to be raised.
Her son, Londell Byrd, a straight-A student who was college-bound, had gotten into an altercation with another teen in the neighborhood and went to meet him to make peace when he was shot repeatedly in the torso.
"He was shot at 3:30 in the afternoon. We have to do something. These kids are out of control," Soto said at the rally, which was attended by the Harlem anti-gang group S.N.U.G. and the National Action Network. "I work two jobs and to have someone come and take my son's life.
"The first thing we have to go through is changing the mindset of these kids that the solution to conflict resolution is guns."
After meeting in front of the State Office Building, the group marched to the Schomburg Center on 135th Street and Lenox Avenue where they held a vigil for the families and victims of gun violence.
"It's important that we all come out here today," director of S.N.U.G, Robin Holmes said. "We need to take our streets back."
